In Ruinous Heart
by DownWithBananafish
Summary: "After Achilles had left, she'd been careful not to speak of the war, but it was hard not to- they were living it." Some shameless Patroklos/Briseis drabbles, set in the years before the opening of The Iliad.


She has taken to watching him as he works, his gentle hands moving over somebody's tattered flesh, mouth moving almost silently, whispering comfort, distracting from the pain: you'll be alright. You're alive. You were a hero today. You did well. Just think: you can go home the minute the war's over. You're alright. You're alive. Just hold on until they let you out of this mess. Hold on, come on, stay alive. . . I know it hurts, I know, I know, I know. Shh. Calm down. You're alive. Shh.

She sees his face when the man goes limp in his arms. He turns away, and she wonders if this is why he never speaks to her: he's wasted all his words on the dead.

After a while she begins to spend time with him in Achilleus' tent. They talk; neither are particularly good conversationalists, but they manage—starting off small, with idle chatter and gossip of their superiors, then larger, each of them sharing tiny pieces of their past a little at a time.

He tells her about the dice, about the argument, about the things the boy had said to him that made his blood run cold, and the awful roaring in his ears when he gets angry and the way you feel that there is nothing else to do but run, because he says, he knows he is a coward and he hates it, he hates it more than he hates Agamamemnon and the rest of those bastards out there playing Achilleus like a puppet on a string and the way he feels when Achilleus comes back with somebody else's blood smeared on his clothes like the blackberry juice that dribbled down their chins in Phthia. He tells her about how it sounded when the boy's skull smashed against the rock, and she doesn't wince when he describes it but merely listens, and he realizes he hasn't spoken like this since he was a child. He knows he should ask her about her life, her memories, her dreams and fears and loves but he can't seem to stop talking, and he thinks perhaps he's as arrogant as Achilleus, this selfish, this insensitive, but then he doesn't care anymore because there's death and heartache everywhere and he can't look at Achilleus now without seeing the widows of the innocent men he's killed but he'll die anyway and it's awful, he says, because he knew he'd lose his friend but he thought it would just be to Hades, not to the cruelty, the hubris and corruption that sinks them all, sooner or later. He talks about his exile, the pain and the shame of it, and meeting Achilleus, and how it felt like the world was finally putting itself back together, piece by piece, and how later it was nice to be protected by somebody, because he knew from experience he couldn't do it himself.

She listens and nods and grimaces in the right places and then she tells him about other things, things that make him wish he hadn't pitied himself at all because really, she's had it much worse. She tells him about her husband who never cared for her much but he was somebody who made her feel less alone, and about Achilleus killing him without so much as a second glance. The same day, she says, he and the other soldiers killed her brothers and her father, and she knows she can never forgive him for that, no matter who he is, because now there is nobody, and she's seen the look in the Greek's eyes when he grips his spear and plunges, and now, well, it seems as though the war will never end. Will it?

She poses this question to him, one evening, as they're sitting in the tent, between patients. Earlier that day Achilleus had come in with a slight wound to the hand, and the look in Patroklos' eyes had been unreadable as he bandaged it, his lips pressed into a hard, careful line that could have meant anything from they're killing him to he deserves it. After Achilleus had left, she'd been careful not to speak of the war, but it was hard not to: they were living it.

"Have faith in the heroes," he answers, startling her, and it's the first time she has heard that bitter twist to his voice. "Once they take Troy, we'll be done with this madness, you and I. Until then. . ."

His head jerks up. Achilleus' figure shadows the entryway, gesturing at Briseis, with his injured hand, to follow him to his tent. It's nighttime, and that's where she belongs.

* * *

><p>Briseis imagines Patroklos' expression, how much it sickens him that she is reduced to a pawn in their game of plunder and greed rather than a human being with feelings and thoughts and ideas. Have faith in the heroes, he whispers in the back of her mind, and she does, but not the way he meant. She has faith in him (because he has patience, and kindness, and one of the most beautiful faces she has ever seen) and in herself (because she's brave and strong when the occasion demands it, and proud of the way she keeps her dignity even when all is lost). She has seen enough of the world to know that not every story has a happy ending, but, just this once, she allows herself to hope.<p>

* * *

><p>Days, weeks, months, years later, they're sitting in the tent again, and there's a man there with a missing leg and another with a spear through the stomach and another whose entire body is bathed in blood. They're a smooth, well-oiled machine: Patroklos is mixing the salves now, and Briseis has taken over his old position, confident in her ability to heal and sew and wash and not faint at the sight of rotting flesh, and it's better this way because now it's Patroklos who tries to save them and Briseis who knows how to watch them die. She's doing her best to keep one soldier's intestines where they belong while he crushes herbs for the puncture wound of another, and she doesn't think either of them have ever been happier.<p>

It doesn't matter, she decides, what might happen in the future. It doesn't matter that one day Achilleus will die and Patroklos will be buried with him. It doesn't matter that she'll go to Greece with some stranger after the war is over, to live out the rest of her life as the slave she is now. It doesn't matter that she'll never see Anatolia again, that he'll never have epics written about the strength, the kindness, the courage of Achilleus' companion, unhappy Patroklos. It doesn't matter that neither of them will really live past the war, even if their bodies aren't burned until later. For the moment, it doesn't matter, because they have each other, and they have found some happiness, however small or short-lived, in a world that was never kind to either of them.

So when Achilleus appears in the entryway of the tent, demanding Agamemnon's prize, it's not as though they were expecting anything better.


End file.
